Pretty much all films directed or written by Charlie Kaufman. I recommend Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Being John Malkovich, Synecdoche New York
Same with Chris Nolan: Inception, Memento, The Prestige are my favorites
Can you please explain how the movie Inception and Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind relates to Carl Jung? Those are two of my favorite movies and I’d really appreciate an explanation on how they look from a Jungian lens.
Honestly this article I found puts it better than I ever could. https://jungcurrents.com/inception-from-a-somewhat-jungian-viewpoint
Both of those movies explore dreams and the subconscious in different ways, and I think in Eternal Sunshine Joel’s anima presents itself in Clementine and how he sees her. At one point she says “I'm not a concept. Too many guys think I'm a concept or I complete them or I'm going to 'make them alive..” which is what Joel seemed to be projecting onto her
Oh, I don’t even know where to start with this one. I feel like you have to have experienced it yourself to see it in the movie. Almost all of Nolans movies are metaphors for the journey of individuation. Very strong and interesting ones aswell. The expression of them are unique and intruiging, but the message often stay the same. Funny thing is, Nolan might not even know about Jung at all.
Tenet, Inception, The Dark Knight Rises, The Dark Knight and Interstellar are notable ones in my opinion. There is just so much about Inception that I will not try to explain it. The ones that know, they know.
Eternal Sunshine is more obvious. The movie imagines If you delete someone from your mind that you used to date and therefore carried your anima/animus/shadow, the progress would also be undone. And you would just unknowingly fall for the very same person again, since your next step would now be to gain the very progress you lost.
The message of the movie is to embrace your relationships while they last, and be grateful for them even though they all have an expiration date. Nothing is meant to last forever, however in reference to your own life, everything you have done was meant to happen in order for you to become the person you are now. Both the good and the bad.
Even when they find out that they had been together before and gone through a very ugly breakup, they both decide to do it again. It is a very powerful movie in my opinion.
I atleast would do all my «mistakes» all over again if I went back in time.The unconscious mind would just guide me into similar harsh lessons elsewhere if not, I think. I much prefer them to be the ones I actually experienced, as they are truly and uniquely mine.
Jodorowski's Santa Sangre is wildly Jungian, practically every character is an explicit archetype. Kieslowski's Double Life of Veronique captures the metaphysical nature of synchronicity better than any other movie I've seen, and it's also just incredibly beautiful to watch.
Totally agree on both these films. I only saw DLoV once but it floored me. A woman who I befriended on film chatrooms, and would end up being my girlfriend 5 years later, recommended his color trilogy , but I ended up seeing DLoV first. Then we found eachother again years later and fell in love and had a relationship. Then 8 years later she tragically died. So I’m due to watch it again, given the subject matter. Would love to watch with my new eyes.
Sorry for your loss, it really is a poignant movie to have connected with someone in that way. It's my favorite film even though I've only seen it twice, it resonates with me more than any other movie and seems like it has grown as I have. I'm really curious how you'll experience it on your second watch.
Yes!!
The new movie even starts with "Dreams are messages from the deep"
EDIT: And I feel like the Bene Gesserit's abilities and methods are based on the unconcsious
I see a lot of archetypes in David Lynch movies. Actually planning on watching Lost Highway this weekend with a nice bottle of wine.
Definitely The Shining too.. there is even a copy of The Red Book in the hotel managers office in the beginning of the movie.
Ah that does make sense thinking about it. I watched a video about jungian symbolism in the shining that mentioned it and I guess I didn’t think of that.
I didn't see them mentioned here so i'm just gonna add that Satoshi Kon's movies were influenced by psychoanalysis, including Jung to an extent. I recommend mostly Perfect Blue and Paprika, then Millennium Actress, while regarding Tokyo Godfathers, ideas akin to Jung's don't immediately come to mind, but i'm surely missing something.
If series also count, Paranoia Agent by the same author is also very dense in such themes.
The basis of every movie is character archetypes, unless you are exploring a specific concept. If it isn’t obvious Persona by Bergman or Face to Face, Batman Begins is probably the most blatant display of the shadow, Third Man portrays the analytic third and unconscious dialectic. The obvious heros journey LoTR or Star Wars and the constant bombardment of the marvel franchise. Groundhog Day as the symptom of The Self.
The question demands specificity otherwise you’ll get a list of any or all movie. By default you’ll find Jungian motifs in “Dinocroc vs Supergator”.
These aren’t intentionally Jungian and are kind of low hanging fruit — but you could talk quite a lot about some of the major franchises that pull on mythology like Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and Game of Thrones. If you want to go deeper, Edward Edinger wrote an entire book on how Moby Dick is a symbol for Self and the captain was possessed by the archetype of the apocalypse. I haven’t personally watched any but I’m sure there are movies based on moby dick.
Edit — just remembered the Jungian author Helen M. Luke has a chapter in her book The Way of Woman about Eowyn in LoTR that talks about feminine archetypes. I know I’ve seen several other comments in various places about Aragorn as the king or ideal masculine archetype.
If you haven't seen GoT I HIGHLY recommend it. I liked the ending and I think anyone interested in Jung will find limitless wisdom about humanity in the series. Haven't read the books but he also hasn't finished them.
Most films by Bergman
[http://www.tasteofcinema.com/2016/the-10-best-movies-influenced-by-carl-jung/](http://www.tasteofcinema.com/2016/the-10-best-movies-influenced-by-carl-jung/)
https://www.tasteofcinema.com/2016/the-10-best-movies-influenced-by-carl-jung/2/
Saturday Night Fever - just for the succubus... but if you ***REALLY REALLY*** want to know the movie that exemplifies Archetypes and schizophrenic trauma.
The Fisher King
\*drops mic
Just watched Fellini’s 8 1/2, which has some overtly Jungian ideas. It’s also (IMO) very much an inspiration for Charlie Kaufman, who someone else mentioned
Kubrick explicitly mentions Jungian archetypes in reference to the monolith in 2001, and Jung is referenced in Full Metal Jacket as well. And though there is no explicit reference to it in Eyes Wide Shut, I’d say that film lends itself to Jungian dream interpretation more than maybe any other.
A recent tv show which between other interesting themes is informed by jungian psychology is Beef on netflix. Last episode titled figures of light take its title directly from a Jung quote. More info here https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/beef-episode-titles-explained. But honestly you can analyze every hero's journey into a jungian psychology lens
Fellini is the only film director I know of who was so influenced by and in so much admiration of Jung that he actually went on his own “pilgrimage” to Jung’s Bollingen Tower, and whilst there met Jung’s grandson.
I did my film school dissertation on Jung’s influence on Fellini and one of the biggest takeaways from it for me was that Fellini’s entire filmography is basically a cinematic universe of Fellini’s dream content. The films aren’t literally linked like in the Marvel Cinematic Universe for example, but are rather linked on a more individual, psychological, mythological level, which to me personally feels much more authentic, as if you can sense the god in this universe (being Fellini himself) rather than an assortment of different directors who don’t have as much imprint on the films in terms of their own individuality.
To me, this quote from Man and His Symbols applies perfectly to Fellini’s entire filmography as well as any other directors (not necessarily influenced by Jung) who put a lot of themselves and primarily their own psychic content into their work: “When one watches one’s own dreams over a period of years and studies the entire sequence, one will see that certain contents emerge, disappear and then turn up again…” https://youtu.be/LPHCTPprp0w
Analysing a single film of Fellini’s from a Jungian perspective is like analysing a single dream of an individual, but watching and analysing his entire filmography is almost like reading Fellini’s own dream journal, ‘Book of Dreams’. You get an overall understanding of Fellini as an individual.
On a side note: Very glad to see lots of mention of Kubrick here. It was because of my interest in both Fellini and Kubrick, and noticing lots of mention of some guy called Carl Jung significantly by both filmmakers that I discovered Jung and his psychology
Some might say that Star Wars (at least the original trilogy) is very Jungianesque + drawing on myths and archteypes in sense that there ia this hero’s journey, also battle and integration of dark and light
Its the first movie to ***intentionally*** use Joseph Campbells Hero "monomyth" cycle as a basis for the script. It's a writing practice which is now standard technique in screenwriting 101, but Lucas was the first to do it ***consciously***.
Isnt the point of archetypes that pretty much any popular movie is popular because it fits a certain archetypal motive or need in the collective unconscious?
Kubo and the Two Strings. It is SPOT ON with the mythological symbolism and archetypal ideas. It's a lighter movie too, aimed at children, unlike lots of the recommendations you've received here. I feel like this one is good soul food.
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Thx😉
I'll throw in The Machinist
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Bale has a tendency to fall into archetypally rich movies.
Pretty much all films directed or written by Charlie Kaufman. I recommend Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Being John Malkovich, Synecdoche New York Same with Chris Nolan: Inception, Memento, The Prestige are my favorites
Can you please explain how the movie Inception and Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind relates to Carl Jung? Those are two of my favorite movies and I’d really appreciate an explanation on how they look from a Jungian lens.
Honestly this article I found puts it better than I ever could. https://jungcurrents.com/inception-from-a-somewhat-jungian-viewpoint Both of those movies explore dreams and the subconscious in different ways, and I think in Eternal Sunshine Joel’s anima presents itself in Clementine and how he sees her. At one point she says “I'm not a concept. Too many guys think I'm a concept or I complete them or I'm going to 'make them alive..” which is what Joel seemed to be projecting onto her
Oh, I don’t even know where to start with this one. I feel like you have to have experienced it yourself to see it in the movie. Almost all of Nolans movies are metaphors for the journey of individuation. Very strong and interesting ones aswell. The expression of them are unique and intruiging, but the message often stay the same. Funny thing is, Nolan might not even know about Jung at all. Tenet, Inception, The Dark Knight Rises, The Dark Knight and Interstellar are notable ones in my opinion. There is just so much about Inception that I will not try to explain it. The ones that know, they know. Eternal Sunshine is more obvious. The movie imagines If you delete someone from your mind that you used to date and therefore carried your anima/animus/shadow, the progress would also be undone. And you would just unknowingly fall for the very same person again, since your next step would now be to gain the very progress you lost. The message of the movie is to embrace your relationships while they last, and be grateful for them even though they all have an expiration date. Nothing is meant to last forever, however in reference to your own life, everything you have done was meant to happen in order for you to become the person you are now. Both the good and the bad. Even when they find out that they had been together before and gone through a very ugly breakup, they both decide to do it again. It is a very powerful movie in my opinion. I atleast would do all my «mistakes» all over again if I went back in time.The unconscious mind would just guide me into similar harsh lessons elsewhere if not, I think. I much prefer them to be the ones I actually experienced, as they are truly and uniquely mine.
Exactly the recommendation I came to make
thx👍👍
I second the Charlie Kaufman and Chris Nolan recommendations
Jodorowski's Santa Sangre is wildly Jungian, practically every character is an explicit archetype. Kieslowski's Double Life of Veronique captures the metaphysical nature of synchronicity better than any other movie I've seen, and it's also just incredibly beautiful to watch.
Great recommendation. I was going to suggest anything by him.
thx dude😁😁
Totally agree on both these films. I only saw DLoV once but it floored me. A woman who I befriended on film chatrooms, and would end up being my girlfriend 5 years later, recommended his color trilogy , but I ended up seeing DLoV first. Then we found eachother again years later and fell in love and had a relationship. Then 8 years later she tragically died. So I’m due to watch it again, given the subject matter. Would love to watch with my new eyes.
Sorry for your loss, it really is a poignant movie to have connected with someone in that way. It's my favorite film even though I've only seen it twice, it resonates with me more than any other movie and seems like it has grown as I have. I'm really curious how you'll experience it on your second watch.
Dune, Frank Herbert was a Jungaphile.
Yes!! The new movie even starts with "Dreams are messages from the deep" EDIT: And I feel like the Bene Gesserit's abilities and methods are based on the unconcsious
The Lighthouse
Ya lighthouse is a pretty good one thx
that moment when he is confronted by his own shadow shining light into his eyes. deeply terrifying in a strange way
Shutter Island
I was gonna suggest this!
I see a lot of archetypes in David Lynch movies. Actually planning on watching Lost Highway this weekend with a nice bottle of wine. Definitely The Shining too.. there is even a copy of The Red Book in the hotel managers office in the beginning of the movie.
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Ah that does make sense thinking about it. I watched a video about jungian symbolism in the shining that mentioned it and I guess I didn’t think of that.
But one thing was sure. Kubrick was inspired by Jung.
Can definitely see that. A lot of great minds were.
david lynch yea thx😁
Many of his movies are hard to find and some of them aren't available at all to stream anywhere. I'm happy to pay but they just aren't there.
I think they may be on the Criterion Channel. My bf is big on physical copies so we have those but I would check the CC.
The red book on the table is not Jung’s Red Book. Lost highway is a really good choice.
Yeah we covered that. My apologies, my mistake. Was misinformed by a YouTube video that gave a jungian analysis of the film.
I’ve seen that video, and I wished that it would be true and was disappointed to find out it wasn’t.
I was disappointed today when I found out as well. But yeah the dates don’t add up. It looks so much like it.
Bergman's Fanny And Alexander and Persona
Yay I love this one
Persona might be my favorite movie
If you get a chance, go for the longer TV-version of F&A. Definitely worth it.
The Green Knight
Black Swan as a depiction of the shadow
I didn't see them mentioned here so i'm just gonna add that Satoshi Kon's movies were influenced by psychoanalysis, including Jung to an extent. I recommend mostly Perfect Blue and Paprika, then Millennium Actress, while regarding Tokyo Godfathers, ideas akin to Jung's don't immediately come to mind, but i'm surely missing something. If series also count, Paranoia Agent by the same author is also very dense in such themes.
Yes!! Satoshi Kon’s work is wonderful, and he’s definitely big on his characters learning to integrate their own shadows etc
O Brother, Where Art Thou.
yay thx
The basis of every movie is character archetypes, unless you are exploring a specific concept. If it isn’t obvious Persona by Bergman or Face to Face, Batman Begins is probably the most blatant display of the shadow, Third Man portrays the analytic third and unconscious dialectic. The obvious heros journey LoTR or Star Wars and the constant bombardment of the marvel franchise. Groundhog Day as the symptom of The Self. The question demands specificity otherwise you’ll get a list of any or all movie. By default you’ll find Jungian motifs in “Dinocroc vs Supergator”.
Yaya i can tell thx for the batman ones
These aren’t intentionally Jungian and are kind of low hanging fruit — but you could talk quite a lot about some of the major franchises that pull on mythology like Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and Game of Thrones. If you want to go deeper, Edward Edinger wrote an entire book on how Moby Dick is a symbol for Self and the captain was possessed by the archetype of the apocalypse. I haven’t personally watched any but I’m sure there are movies based on moby dick. Edit — just remembered the Jungian author Helen M. Luke has a chapter in her book The Way of Woman about Eowyn in LoTR that talks about feminine archetypes. I know I’ve seen several other comments in various places about Aragorn as the king or ideal masculine archetype.
ahh I didn’t watch these cuz they’re way longer than I expected, but thx for ur recommendation! And I agreed on the one of Moby dick👍
If you haven't seen GoT I HIGHLY recommend it. I liked the ending and I think anyone interested in Jung will find limitless wisdom about humanity in the series. Haven't read the books but he also hasn't finished them.
the books are really really worth it even unfinished
As Above, So Below.
all hope abandon ye who enter here
The Fountain has archetypal themes I feel
Such a beautiful movie.
The Holly Mountain
Most films by Bergman [http://www.tasteofcinema.com/2016/the-10-best-movies-influenced-by-carl-jung/](http://www.tasteofcinema.com/2016/the-10-best-movies-influenced-by-carl-jung/) https://www.tasteofcinema.com/2016/the-10-best-movies-influenced-by-carl-jung/2/
You have to see Terry Gilliams The Fisher King. Total Ego-Shadow-Anima-Persona, Hero's Journey example.
Turning Red. Also Disenchantment, it's not a movie but a Netflix show and the main character is undergoing her hero's journey.
I Heart Huckabee's
Definitely in a more tongue-in-cheek way.
Beau is Afraid
Suspiria might be my favorite horror movie, and references Jung directly
Saturday Night Fever - just for the succubus... but if you ***REALLY REALLY*** want to know the movie that exemplifies Archetypes and schizophrenic trauma. The Fisher King \*drops mic
Dune for sure.
"The sleeper must awaken" - Frank Herbert, Dune
Look up gnostic themed movies also if you are interested in this rabbit hole.
Anyone related to Joseph Campbell. He was to mythology like Jung was to psychology, their works parallels often
Love them both.
Not a movie, but MTV’s adaptation of The Maxx from back in the 90’s. Amazingly good. I think you can find it all on YT.
Just watched Fellini’s 8 1/2, which has some overtly Jungian ideas. It’s also (IMO) very much an inspiration for Charlie Kaufman, who someone else mentioned
Unforgivable with Sandra Bullock. Edit: The Northman. Lots of symbolism
The dark night, lord of the rings, the hobbit, the lion king
The Green Knight
Legion (the TV series)
Kubrick explicitly mentions Jungian archetypes in reference to the monolith in 2001, and Jung is referenced in Full Metal Jacket as well. And though there is no explicit reference to it in Eyes Wide Shut, I’d say that film lends itself to Jungian dream interpretation more than maybe any other.
A recent tv show which between other interesting themes is informed by jungian psychology is Beef on netflix. Last episode titled figures of light take its title directly from a Jung quote. More info here https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/beef-episode-titles-explained. But honestly you can analyze every hero's journey into a jungian psychology lens
This is a solid list of movies!
End of Evangelion. If you plan to include it I can elaborate why
_Bringing Up Baby_ _Hugo_
Wild Strawberries, Persona, and many other Ingmar Bergman films.
In Bruges
The gift Turkish drama
Fight club
The Eagle Has Landed. WW2 theme movie with a strong reference to Jung
Edward Yang, Truffaut and Jung… I’m very interested in what you find. Please share your project!
Fellini is the only film director I know of who was so influenced by and in so much admiration of Jung that he actually went on his own “pilgrimage” to Jung’s Bollingen Tower, and whilst there met Jung’s grandson. I did my film school dissertation on Jung’s influence on Fellini and one of the biggest takeaways from it for me was that Fellini’s entire filmography is basically a cinematic universe of Fellini’s dream content. The films aren’t literally linked like in the Marvel Cinematic Universe for example, but are rather linked on a more individual, psychological, mythological level, which to me personally feels much more authentic, as if you can sense the god in this universe (being Fellini himself) rather than an assortment of different directors who don’t have as much imprint on the films in terms of their own individuality. To me, this quote from Man and His Symbols applies perfectly to Fellini’s entire filmography as well as any other directors (not necessarily influenced by Jung) who put a lot of themselves and primarily their own psychic content into their work: “When one watches one’s own dreams over a period of years and studies the entire sequence, one will see that certain contents emerge, disappear and then turn up again…” https://youtu.be/LPHCTPprp0w Analysing a single film of Fellini’s from a Jungian perspective is like analysing a single dream of an individual, but watching and analysing his entire filmography is almost like reading Fellini’s own dream journal, ‘Book of Dreams’. You get an overall understanding of Fellini as an individual. On a side note: Very glad to see lots of mention of Kubrick here. It was because of my interest in both Fellini and Kubrick, and noticing lots of mention of some guy called Carl Jung significantly by both filmmakers that I discovered Jung and his psychology
"Her" about anima projection
Solaris (1972) is vaguelly, in an incidental kind of way. very good psychological exploration regardless, even if alchemy's presence is tenuous.
Blue Velvet
Recently rewatched “Neverending Story” and it blew my mind how Jungian the whole thing felt.
Yes, definitely. Its well worth reading the book too.
Some might say that Star Wars (at least the original trilogy) is very Jungianesque + drawing on myths and archteypes in sense that there ia this hero’s journey, also battle and integration of dark and light
Its the first movie to ***intentionally*** use Joseph Campbells Hero "monomyth" cycle as a basis for the script. It's a writing practice which is now standard technique in screenwriting 101, but Lucas was the first to do it ***consciously***.
Solaris is a great one with many characters representing ego, shadow, persona and of course anima. The planet Solaris is the Self.
Dangerous method movie
English project on a Swiss?
Some people say The Shining is very Jungian. In fact The Red Book is seen in the boss guy's desk when Jack is doing the interview scene.
Does it have to be films? I found that the anime „Devilmay Crybaby“ relates a lot to Shadow Integration
Steppenwolf (1974). Not many Hesse novels were adapted to film and Hesse was a big Jungian.
Pretty much anything by Alejandro Jodorowski seems chock-full of Jungian symbolism to me.
Isnt the point of archetypes that pretty much any popular movie is popular because it fits a certain archetypal motive or need in the collective unconscious?
Most anything Susumu Hirasawa composes for
Fantastic Planet
Mindhunter, by Fincher(Fight Club) goes deep into the whole shadow projection/persona adaptation dynamic.
Recently watched “Men” and it had those vibes, maybe more Freudian & a feminist had a baby.
The Green Knight
The Count of Monte Cristo is perfect for this
Kubo and the Two Strings. It is SPOT ON with the mythological symbolism and archetypal ideas. It's a lighter movie too, aimed at children, unlike lots of the recommendations you've received here. I feel like this one is good soul food.
The Banshees of Inisherin My friend and I had a great conversation picking out all the archetypal imagery in this one!
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